Structures improve life at Camp Hope

Camp Hope is hoping to continue building new weather structures that residents of the camp can place their tents in to help keep them protected from the weather and wear and tear on their tents. The camp currently has three of the four structures occupied, January 6, 2017(Photo: Josh Bachman/Sun-News)Buy Photo

LAS CRUCES – Thanks to students at Doña Ana Community College, the winter months are a little more bearable for some residents of Camp Hope. The DACC Construction Industries student club is helping to build shelters for the homeless residents of the tent city, located on the campus of Mesilla Valley Community of Hope.

In the past several months, four three-sided tent shelters have been constructed and installed at Camp Hope. The student club and several DACC classes provide the labor to construct the structures. In total, more than 20 students per semester are involved in the effort.

Nicole Martinez, executive director of Community of Hope, said the project has been in the works for more than five years.

“Shortly after I became interim director in 2011, Kevin Gall from DACC came to me and said he wanted to do tiny homes out here,” Martinez recalled Friday. “I said, ‘Great. Let’s work on that. And how about you join my board of directors?’”

Gall, the director of the Construction Trades program at DACC, joined the organization’s board of directors, but plans for permanent tiny homes were derailed.

“At that time, the camp was very new,” Martinez said. “Nobody knew how long it would last, or if it would be successful. At that time, we didn’t have a whole lot of support going forward. Early on, the community college donated a structure the students had built — which is currently the Camp Hope office.”

Any improvements at Camp Hope required the approval of the city of Las Cruces, which owns the property. However, the city is not allowed to grant permits for property it owns, Martinez said. Once any project is approved by the city, it must then receive final approval and building permits from the New Mexico Construction Industries Division.

In dealing with CID, Martinez quickly learned that tiny homes would not work. The property is zoned for commercial use — not residential— and, even if permitted, any dwellings would be required to have fire sprinklers.

“We just kept running into roadblocks,” Martinez recalled.

Then an idea occurred to her — inspired by her favorite campground, she said.

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Nicole Martinez, executive director of Mesilla Valley Community of Hope, explains the designs for new, three-sided structures being installed at Camp Hope to protect residents and their tents from the elements. The ongoing project has, so far, provided four Adirondack structures for the camp.(Photo: Damien Willis / Las Cruces Sun-News)

“I thought about one of my favorite camping places, Springtime Campground, near Magdalena,” Martinez said. “They have six Adirondack structures. They are three-sided, log cabin structures on elevated tent pads with a roof. I thought, since it’s allowed for camping, maybe it would be allowed for us. I went back to CID, and they said, ‘Now you’re onto something.’”

Karla Padilla, a student in DACC’s architecture program, designed 3D models of the kind of structure Martinez envisioned, and the plans were approved by the state in June 2016. Gall designed the plans, and students from New Mexico State University’s Aggies Without Limits group recommended a few changes before Kenny Stevens, an associate professor of engineering technology and the group’s faculty adviser, approved the plans.

Gall, a Vietnam war veteran, said he was drawn to the project because he wanted to help other vets in need. With the plans approved, he quickly enlisted students to help. During the fall semester, the students constructed and installed four of the structures at Camp Hope.

Each of the structures costs about $750 for materials, Martinez said. So far, the project has been funded through private donations.

“We prefab them in our lab, then we haul them down to Community of Hope and assemble them,” Gall told the Sun-News. “We kind of got a late start last semester, but we were able to install four. And we have two more that are built and are ready to take down and assemble.”

Gall said he hopes to have 12 completed by the end of the spring semester, and 35 by the end of the year.

“There has been quite a bit of support and encouragement from members of community who have asked if we needed volunteers,” Gall said. “I’ve been thinking about having a volunteer day at my lab, perhaps on a Saturday, if we can work out the logistics. When you get too many volunteers, each working on individual tasks, it can become hard to manage.”

Martinez and Gall said the tent structures not only protect residents from the elements, they also increase the longevity of the tents.

“Tents are not built to be lived in,” Martinez said. “They’re meant to pull out once or twice a year to go camping. The day-to-day wear, and constant exposure to the sunlight, is just more than they can handle. The zippers usually give out within the first month.”

Residents repair tears with duct tape and use tarps for added protection against the elements. Joe, a resident at Camp Hope who declined to give his last name, has lived at the camp intermittently for about two years, he said. He recently moved into one of the covered tent structures.

“It’s an improvement,” he said. “Before, I had to put a bunch of tarps on top of the tent, just to keep warm. The shelter helps trap some of the heat, and now I just hang a blanket over the tent’s door. It makes a big difference in the colder months.”

Martinez said she would continue to monitor the conditions in the structures as the weather gets warmer, and the structures may be modified if necessary.

Martinez said sponsorships of tent sites are also being accepted, and that she intends to mount plaques at Camp Hope to recognize sponsors. Camp Hope is at 999 W. Amador Ave., adjacent to Mesilla Valley Community of Hope. Donations for the project, and to help meet the general needs of the homeless, continue to be accepted.